


Contracts Through the Worlds

by Buttons15



Category: The Inheritance Cycle - Christopher Paolini, Wiedźmin | The Witcher (Video Game), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-30
Updated: 2016-01-11
Packaged: 2018-04-18 02:50:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 21,139
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4689626
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Buttons15/pseuds/Buttons15
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Ciri makes a visit to Alagaesia and gets hired for an interesting and very well paid job for the king.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

When the possibilities are infinite, one quickly grows tired of them and searches for something familiar. Ciri knew that more than no one. That didn’t mean she didn’t enjoy vacation trips to another universe or two. Particularly because if she stood on her own land for extended periods of time people started looking for her, people such as the Lodge, the Emperor, every other king and the occasional supremacist elf.

So it was that Ciri felt the need to literally drop off the face of the world every now and then, and so it was that she found herself collecting bounty leaflet in the large yet crammed citadel of Urû’Baen, which the witcheress knew was elfish for either “The Downfall of the Wise” or  “This Piss-smelling slum”. She was leaning more towards the latter.

Bounty hunting was mercenary work, not a witcher’s, but Ciri had quickly learnt that when travelling dimensions, one had to learn to be flexible about what kind of work they got. Geralt had taught her that by restricting her services to the killing of monsters, she could be free of the burden of moral judgments. What Ciri later found out was that she didn’t mind having to make those calls – as long as she got to charge double for them.

She went through the papers posted on the walls, searching for any criminal who would give her a fat purse but also a good adventure.

_Gruffy macho bandit, Filthy cutpurse, Smartass con artist –_

She stopped at a drawing of a woman with high cheekbones and pointed ears. An elf. Her fingers lingered tentatively over the parchment. On one hand, there was definitely a good story waiting to unfold if she chose to pursue that one. On the other hand…

_I fucking hate elves. Rightfully hate elves._

She hesitated for another second before ripping the paper away, rolling it up and placing it on her pocket.  She studied the contracts a bit longer, and spotted another interesting offer. A very high sum over a very common, bland-looking brown haired young man.

_Two hundred golden crowns and an earldom for this farmboy for treason?_

She pocketed that bounty also, then made her way to her contractor – the king. She half walked, half blinked her way through the levels of the city, reading the papers as she went.  Both the elf and the boy were tagged as “extremely dangerous”, though his bounty was almost twice hers.

A drunken man yelped in surprise as she materialized in front of him – and away.

 She flashed her way to the castle absently, engrossed on the pictures of her targets.

A pair of kids screamed, pointing at her.

She appeared on a rooftop. Up a tree branch. Inside someone’s bedroom –

_Oh, gross! The fetishes people have!_

She paid more attention where she was going after that, and it took her less than a minute to arrive one corner away from the large castle. She walked the remaining distance to the gate, where she was promptly stopped by two brutes.

“Greetings,” She began. “I desire an audience with your king.”

“Why that’s an awfully sharp stick she got with her, Bert,” One of the men snorted, then spat on the floor.

Bert laughed. “Looking like she poked herself in the pretty face with it!”

Ciri took a deep breath and counted to ten.

“Ser, please. I require an audience to discuss –”

“Ohh, she requires an audience!” The guard mocked. “Why don’t you and I have an ‘audience’ and I teach you to use a proper sword?”

They snorted like pigs. Ciri’s patience was running really thin, really quick.

“Ser, if you’re not going to let me through, at least let me talk to the one responsible for these bounties,”

She pulled the papers out of her pocket and unrolled them. Bert paled slightly at the sight of the criminal’s faces, but his companion snorted.

“This little miss is going to capture the Shadeslayer, are you?”

She opened her mouth to reply, but they were interrupted by a loud, commanding voice.

“Am I seeing what I am seeing?” A man walked from inside the gates and towards them. He had deep obsidian eyes and broad shoulders, and a malicious half-smile that hinted at either great intelligence or great insanity, perhaps both. “Are two of my guards giving a lady a hard time?”

The two men froze. Bert tried to say something, stammered, then immediately fell quiet. The newcomer looked at the two with undisguised contempt.

“Go,” he spat. The guards didn’t need to be told twice; they scurried off like scared rats. Then the man turned to her. “Now, I believe you wanted to talk to the one responsible for these posters. That would be...me. The king. Ruler of Broddring Empire, King Galbatorix.”

_…wouldn’t that make you an emperor, though?_

She bowed her head politely. “Your Highness.”

Galbatorix’s cold smile widened. “I have been watching you since you set foot in my city. I’ll admit you have my curiosity, and your desire to pursue these two criminals in particular pleases me.”

She smiled. She’d been quite careless with her Elder Blood gifts since she’d arrived, hoping she would call the attention of someone in charge. It was yet another tactic she’d learnt from Geralt, and once more, it had worked perfectly.

The two walked as they talked, and Ciri followed him inside the castle into a large, open room. A long wooden table rested on its middle, and the king motioned for her to take a seat. The witcheress complied, and the ruler sat down in front of her.

“A glass of wine?” He offered.

“Thank you, your Majesty, but I rather keep my head clear. Yes, I am interested in pursuing these two… and the reward. I have my eyes on the reward.”

She placed the two open bounty letters on the table. “One hundred gold crowns on the woman, two hundred on the man. I have no interest in the earldom, so I would have it reversed into another hundred gold coins. That makes it four hundred.”

The king lifted a glass of red wine and twirled it between his fingers. “Those two are dangerous criminals.”

“I gathered that much,” Ciri answered. _It’s written._ “I assure you I am competent. It would help, however, if you could share any information about the two.”

Galbatorix’s eyes twinkled. “You mean you have not heard? You must be from a distant corner of the Empire indeed.”

Ciri crossed her arms. “Forgive me, your Highness, but my credentials shan’t matter for the matter at hand. Let us talk about the job, and let us talk about my reward. If I succeed, we will part and you will never hear of me again. If I fail, I will likely be dead. All the rest is not relevant for the service.”

The king burst out in a humorless laugh. “Very well. May I have your name, at least?”

He already knew her name, she was sure. She’d been on the city for almost three days and she’d been throwing it around as carelessly as she’d been teleporting her way up and down. So she decided to surprise him instead. She’d dodged his question, now she’d throw him a bone.

She leaned in, locked eyes with him and whispered.

_“Zireael.”_

Galbatorix grinned and acquiesced with a nod. “The Swallow.”

He didn’t protest after that exchange, and gave her the information she wanted.

“I want them captured, not killed,” The King clarified. “…well, you may bring me the elf’s head, if there’s no other way, but the boy must not be harmed.”

Ciri bit on her bottom lip. “Mmh. To be honest, assassinations are not usually the kind of service I take,” She admitted.

“And what would that be?”

“I kill monsters. Monsters, by definition: non sentient beasts of magical origin. I also find things, treasures, relics. Sometimes people, if the coin is good enough. Killing for hire has a moral component to it. I charge extra for that – and I might change my mind. I’m quite the wild card.”

Galbatorix plucked a grape and tossed it in his mouth.

“I’ll double it. If only to make sure no one can outpay me. As for your changing your mind…” He paused for a long while. “There is magic I could make use of to assure that wouldn’t happen, but that would taint our relationship, and I believe it shan’t be necessary. Your own morals will make you see the righteousness on my side.”

Ciri arched one eyebrow. “Your confidence is certainly a plus. Tell me of the two I am seek.”

“You will find the two together, most likely,” He declared. “My spies have me informed they can currently be found in the forests of Du Weldenvarden, likely in the city of Ellesméra. There is a war. You see, Swallow, the rebels have broken the piece I long fought to establish –”

“I don’t care,” Ciri interrupted. “I really don’t care. Your politics are of no interest to me. I won’t be picking between an Empire I don’t care about and rebels I care even less. I’ll be picking between you, the king,” She pointed a finger at him, then at the papers. “And those two here. I am indifferent to all the rest… but the reward, of course.”

Galbatorix nodded. “There is something else. One last thing, before we agree on values. You might find it of importance.”

“What is it?” Ciri prompted.

“The boy has a dragon.”

_You’ve got to be shitting me._

“… I am not taking this job for less than a thousand crowns.” The witcheress announced.

“I want it alive.”

“One thousand and a half. Not a crown less. That is the base rate, mind you. I’m charging two and a half hundred for each extra dragon I might meet, double that if you also want them alive.”

“There will be no other dragons. I guarantee it.” The king assured.

“Good!” Ciri agreed. “I’m sure you won’t mind if I double the bonus dragon rate then.”

“I hope you work as well as you bargain,” Galbatorix mused.

“I hope you pay as well as I work,” Ciri retorted.

The king laughed, genuinely amused this time. “Very well. A thousand and a half crowns it is. May I give you another piece of advice?”

The two got up from the table. The king didn’t wait for her reply and resumed talking.

“Go for the elf. If you get her, the boy will chase after, and with him, the dragon. Should you take the boy instead, then the elf may not pursue and she may hold the dragon back.”

That was actually good advice, and Ciri thanked him for it. They walked back to the large gate. There were no signs of the guards who had previously harassed her; the two had instead been substituted by a pair of ogre-like creatures. The witcheress had seen those around the city in good numbers, so she was not surprised to see they took part on the king’s forces.

“I’ll be waiting for news of you, Zireael,” The king declared when they reached the exit.

“You’ll hear of me,” Ciri assured. “Unless you don’t, and then you’ll never hear of me again.”

She didn’t wait for his reply. She merely closed her eyes and blinked away.


	2. Chapter 2

She set her eyes on a fixed spot in the horizon and let her muscles relax. Her eyes drooped to a half lidded lazy stare and she heard more than she felt the _whoosh_ as she bended the laws of physics and dashed across space-time to the spot she’d been staring at. Once there, she looked for another reference point and repeated the process.

She moved a good five or six kilometers with each hop yet her speed was impossible to calculate, for she would randomly let herself slip a few moments back and forth in time every once in a while, so she would often arrive at the spot she’d been looking at _before_ she’d actually left the previous one.  She had long given up on understanding the logic of that, but in moments of relaxation, she would often race with herself.

Technically, it was within her abilities to teleport to locations she’d been or next to people she’d never met, and she could do it accurately enough that she’d show up within a ten meter radius of places with only a picture or a vague description. She could pop up on their doorsteps, grab them and teleport them into the throne room – even the dragon. Maybe.

_Surely the dragon. Caranthir could haul the entire Wild Hunt around, and he had nothing on me._

Yet she rather do this contract the long way, because the process of getting to know the landscape was one she enjoyed and something she could make use of later, and because manually hauling a prisoner all the way to the capitol would give her the time she needed to get to know them and pick her side.

_Not that I don’t have all the time in all the worlds._

She laughed by herself at the level of weirdness her life had acquired.

It was nine hours, forty two minutes, twelve point seventy two seconds in the morning when she reached the edge of the forest. That was about two and a half minutes before she’d arrived at the castle’s door in Urû’baen.

Ciri never lost track of time.

The forest was massive and started abruptly without any kind of transition between the large trees and the surrounding meadows. The witcher’s medallion on her neck vibrated slightly when she walked in, pointing out the rather obvious use of magic all around her.

She paused for five seconds, closed her eyes and moved ahead in a random direction, knowing her feet would lead her correctly. Time and space were but one and the same, to her more than most. Ciri never lost track of time, and so she was never lost in space either.

She eventually met an elf. He was standing there, staring into space and…that was about it. He looked slightly incorporeal, as if his body was merely an avatar.

“Ah, hello,” She greeted. The elf didn’t answer.

_Of course not, Cirilla, you’re talking to a catatonic elf in the middle of a magic forest, the least you can do is speak elfish._

She cleared her throat and tried again, in the elder speech this time.

“Greetings, Ser Elf. I’m Zireael of Cintra.”

Nothing. Not a word.

“Okay…” Ciri trailed off. “I’m off to find the mythical elven city of Ellesméra. Please carry on doing nothing, Ser elf.”

_“All who seek to enter the city must first get the permission of Gilderien the Wise.”_

The message came to her telepathically, which irked her a little. It was rude to call out into people’s minds like that.

“All right… and that would be…you?” She guessed hopefully.

The ghostly elf smiled. She took that as a hint to continue.

“Ser Gilderien the Wise…may I pass?”

The elf finally turned to face her, as if she had only then managed to catch his attention.

_“What would a human child seek in these ancient woods?”_

Her brow twitched involuntarily in annoyance. “I’m not a child. And I’m not fully human, either. There’s some elven blood to me.”

The avatar waited in silence. Ciri continued.

“My great-great-great-great- oh, fuck it,” She lifted her hand and counted on her fingers. “Seven generations past, my ancestor was an elf. That makes me…one fourteenth elf.” She made calculations in her mind. “It doesn’t sound like much, but if you do the maths, you’ll see that to every hundred kilos of Ciri, there is seven kilos of pure elf. That means there’s about four kilos of pointy-earness to me – the weight of an elven newborn. You wouldn’t prevent your infants from entering the city, would you?”

 The elf’s brow furrowed, and Ciri could almost see the little cogwheels turning in his head. Then unexpectedly, he burst out laughing. He opened his arms as if to embrace the wind.

_“Very well, Zireael of Cintra. You may pass.”_

_That bullshit actually worked. Unbelievable._

Ciri passed. Soon the shapes of the city began to emerge, and they brought back memories. When she was but a child of seven or eight, she’d ran away from an arranged marriage and into the woods. She would have been made a dryad if not for Geralt’s interference.

The forest back then looked a lot like the one she walked now. The trees had been shaped into houses and other buildings, all in perfect harmony with nature. There was a stunning lack of elves in the street, and she let her inner compass guide her around a humongous tree to what looked like a governmental building. She could hear a murmur coming from it.

_So that’s where the people went._

She snuck the last few meters to the door, preparing her discourse. She would walk in to seemingly important meeting and introduce herself to the authority figure there. She would discretely find out about her targets and get to know them a little. And then she’d either bring them to the king or leave them be. She was already past their guard, so she figured her interruption would be fine. She could start with ‘Greetings, my name is Zireael.’

A solid plan.

She opened the door as carefully as she could and set it into motion –

And felt her brain being immediately assaulted by about a hundred telepathic probes.

“Hello, my name is – Oh, this is _so fucking rude!_ ”

Lady Yennefer had taught her to protect her mind from invading mages, but containing her anger was another matter entirely. And so Ciri blocked out the intrusive elves by giving them a vivid and thoroughly detailed scene of dwarven anal sex.

Ciri gave the room a quick three-sixty peek. It was auditorium-shaped in a half circle that ended pointing to a throne. It was not hard to find her targets – the dragon gave them away, though she did do a double take between the elf queen and the woman next to the boy – the resemblance was uncanny.

Metallic sounds echoed as swords were drawn. The queen stood up and raised her palm in a halting gesture.

“Identify yourself immediately.”

Her temper flared once more.

“That was _precisely_ what I was doing before you – You know what? Fuck you, you stuck up knife-eared shits.”

She spat.  Scandalized murmurs broke through the crowd, and the boy drew a crimson sword from his belt. Ciri didn’t bother to draw her own blade. Instead, she took a step forward and impossibly closed the gap between herself and the she-elf the king had recommended the capture. No one had expected such move, so Ciri’s elbow connected to the elf’s skull with a satisfying _crunch_.

It took the others in the room a half a second to react and attack, and that was half a second too late. The very moment Ciri’s left arm was striking, her right hand grabbed the elf’s wrist, and she flashed away.

The two landed next to a peculiarly round rock in a meadow, one of the reference points Ciri had used, about two or three hops from the forest’s edge. The elf lumped down and fell, unconscious from the blow. Ciri didn’t hesitate. She unhooked a pair of Dimeritium cuffs from the satchel in her belt and immediately slapped them on the elf’s wrists.

Then she stared up at the sky, where the moon hovered above her. It had been the twenty-second hour, eleventh minute, seventeenth second when they arrived. The elf recovered consciousness only twenty eight seconds after. Yet it had been morning when she was whisked away, and it was night when she opened her eyes, so Ciri could understand the woman’s visible distress once she woke.

She took a little sadistic pleasure from it.

“I’m sorry about your head,” The witcheress said conversationally. “And the shackles, too. Please do not attempt to cast spells, they’re magic blockers and it might kill you.”

“…who are you?”

“Yes, yes, as I was about to so kindly introduce myself before I was rudely interrupted, my name is Zireael of Cintra. According to my bounty poster, you must be elf-princess Arya. Nice to meet you, Arya. Wish it could have been done it under less straining circumstances.”

“Did the king send you?” Arya sat up, tense.

Ciri could tell she was assessing the situation. She had an analytical look in her eyes that the witcheress knew all too well.

“Why yes, as a matter of fact, he did,” Ciri confirmed. “He’s paying me a thousand and a half golden crowns for you, the boy and the dragon, and he was rather warm and receptive when we met. Told me to get you and the other two would follow. Offered me a glass of wine. Pleasant ser, he is.”

The elf’s eyes flashed. “Set me free. Bring me to my mother, and I’ll double it.”

Ciri sat down on the round rock and rested her chin on her knuckles. “I don’t think I will. You see, I had every intention of being nice and sweet. Getting to know the three of you – I might have dropped the contract then. If I found you to be straight of character. But the fact is, the king greeted me with a drink and a job. Your people greeted me by invading my mind. You realize that might cause a certain antipathy _._ ”

Arya blew off a strand of hair from her face, her brow furrowed in concentration. She had seen room for negotiating. Ciri appreciated that.

“We were merely surprised. You caught us off guard and we responded defensively.”

“I got past the guard. He let me in. In my view, that makes me a goddamn guest. If you’re going to attack the people he lets in, you might as well change the guard.”

The elf considered her words for a moment.

“You have expressed concern about the righteousness of our cause. Set me free, Zireael, and I shall prove it to you.”

Ciri crossed her legs and arched her eyebrows.

“No, I have expressed concern over the righteousness of your person,” Ciri corrected. “I couldn’t give less of a fuck about your cause, or the king’s for that matter. He’s paying me really well for you, and the one thing that might have stopped me was finding out you were good people. So far, bad first impressions.”

The elf pressed her lips together and said nothing.

“See, there, this is the matter with you elves. No ‘you’re right, I’m sorry we violated you without asking questions first’. No, you’re elves, you have holier-than-thou reasons for assaulting a lowly human’s mind. For the greater good! This kind of shit is precisely why your people are going extinct in every single dimension. You don’t cooperate. You don’t compromise. You don’t adapt. ”

Ciri turned her head and spat. She lifted a finger and pointed at Arya. “I’m going to tell you how it’s going to be. You and I are walking back to the capitol. It’s a long walk. You’ll have until then to change my mind. You’re a princess, aren’t you? You’re familiar with the diplomacy business. I’ve never, not once in my life, met an elf that hasn’t let me down. Prove me wrong, and you go free. Show me there is something, one single thing decent about your kind. Don’t, and I fulfill my contract.”

The witcheress leaned in and locked eyes with the elf. “But try something, anything funny, and your people will pay for it. In ways you cannot even begin to imagine.” She paused and pointed at the moon. “You were out for twenty eight seconds. Yet when you woke up, over twelve hours had passed. Think about that before you try anything rash. Think about the kind of power you’re dealing with.”

_You’re a bully, Cirilla._

She felt bad for it. She got up and started moving in a random direction. She was certain it was the right one, regardless of where it led them.

Arya followed a good three steps behind.

The elf did not apologize.

And Ciri didn’t feel bad for it anymore.


	3. Chapter 3

There were many questions nagging on Arya’s head, all of which related to her captor, the most pressing one, of course, involving her escape. The two had been travelling for quite some time now, and the elf was concerned about incoming search parties. She worried that they wouldn’t come, and then she worried what would this woman do to them if they did.

Zireael walked at leisure pace, stopping to lunch and sleep with no hurry at all, as if pursuit was absolutely insignificant, and she hadn’t even bothered to disarm the elf. That kind of confidence made Arya apprehensive. The white haired woman was either absurdly powerful or completely insane, and considering how she had invaded an elven meeting and snatched away their princess, neither option was very appealing.

And then there was the fact that Zireael was leading them on the wrong direction. Arya thought at first that it was done to confuse their trackers, but it was the third day and they were still moving perpendicularly to Urû’baen and now she was just plain confused. Perhaps the other one was lost.

_I doubt that somehow._

When they sat down at a camp fire that day, she finally got over her distaste and asked the woman some questions.

“Where are we going?”

The human pulled a wedge of cheese from her backpack, cut it in half and handed the elf a part, then nibbled on her own piece.

“To the capitol, I told you.”

Arya spat, her emerald eyes blazing. “Do you take me for a fool? This is not the way to Urû’baen.”

The ashen haired woman’s expression changed into a sly half-smile and she placed her palms on the ground, extending her legs.

“Right, I forget. You haven’t been around me long. Well, Arya,” She stared up at the sky. “I don’t always take the obvious path, or the shortest. But I always get to my objectives, and I am never lost.”

_You’re mad._

She was more and more convinced of that by the second. Zireal’s behavior was strange, borderline bizarre. The human was convinced she could travel through space-time at will, something Arya knew was impossible. Which was not to say she didn’t have power, and a lot of it to boot. She was fluent in the Ancient Language and unquestionably versed in the arcane, and the magic-suppressing shackles were no fluke either.

The elf drew in a long breath. It was hard to make a move when she had no idea what she was dealing with. This uncertainty was the one reason she hadn’t killed the woman in her sleep or made a run for it.

“Zireael –”

“You know, I regret telling you that’s my name. Everyone who ever called me that was after my head and it makes me hate you a little. Please call me Cirilla instead, if you will.”

_Glad to know you only hate me a little. Because I hate you a lot._

“ – Cirilla.” She sighed in defeat. “Why are you doing this?”

The woman absently removed the leather gloves that covered her hands. “Do you mean, why am I here and not in my own home world, shopping for birthday gifts for my mum? Or do you mean, why am I apparently so intent on ruining your life?”

She had wit, Arya had to give her that. “Both? Mostly the latter.”

She plucked off a leaf of grass and put it between her teeth. “Why am I here? Politics, politics. You could call me a… refugee, I suppose. No particular reason why I chose this world. Chance. Now, why am I so intent in doing this? Mmh. A quest for personal growth and forgiveness. I’m sorry you got caught up in it…well, not really. At least it’s not personal.”

The woman blew off a strand of ashen hair from her face, revealing the ugly scar on her cheek. _That_ was another thing that got Arya on edge. People with big scars were very often a sign of trouble.

“I just want to make friends with you,” Cirilla gestured with her palm, and then, as if that wasn’t weird enough, she winked.

_…What?_

Arya blinked and lifted a skeptical eyebrow. “You know what doesn’t go well with friendship? Shackles.”

The human chuckled. “And if I were to set you free, wouldn’t you run away at that very instant?”

_No, I would kill you. You’d go back to the king, and you’ve somehow found Ellesméra. You’ve seen too much._

“I wouldn’t,” The elf replied. It wasn’t a strict lie.

Cirilla rolled her eyes and scoffed. “You don’t think I’m serious, do you? All right. Fine.”

She reached for something in her pouch and threw it at her prisoner. Arya reacted on pure reflex and caught the projectile in her hands –

A key.

She stared at the object, then at Cirilla. Back at her hand with disbelief. With elven grace, she slid the key into the opening and twisted, and sure enough, the handcuffs opened. She rubbed her wrists slowly, her eyes still dead-set on watching the human.

“You’re welcome,” Cirilla taunted. “If you try to run away, I’m going to tilt the rotational axis of your world, it will freeze over and everyone will die. Or I’ll rip the veils of reality open and let this land be flooded with all kind of magical atrocities that will make your king look like a toddler. It’ll be horrible. Everyone will die. You should behave.”

Arya hesitated, her hand slowly reaching for the blade on her hip. The ashen haired woman followed the movement with her intense emerald eyes.

“You didn’t say anything about attacking you,” The elf pointed out. “I wasn’t planning on letting you get away.”

Cirilla laughed. She stood up with one fluid movement and dusted herself, and Arya was quick to jump up and draw her blade. “That is a terrible idea. I’m going to kick your ass.”

_She wears her sword on her back._

That, too, was something that got to Arya’s nerves, because it was just wrong. It was impractical. It hindered the arm’s movement and there was just no way someone could draw a blade from that position –

“Let’s dance.”

_Holy fucking Menoa!_

It turned out Cirilla _could_ draw a sword from her back . In breakneck speed.

Their blades met with a clash, and Arya barely had time to catch her breath, her face so close to the woman’s, their noses almost touched. And then the elf backed and struck, but her attack met empty air. She saw movement on the corner of her vision and deflected a blow with the flat of her sword. She slid her blade over Cirilla’s, but the sound of metal scratching metal was abruptly silenced when her opponent simply vanished.

_That’s impossible –_

A buzzing sound reached her ears and she ducked. Cirilla’s sword whooshed over her head –

And gone. Arya moved on pure instinct and rolled forward. She got on her feet and turned back to face her opponent.

The human was grinning viciously, baring her teeth. She was surrounded by a pulsating magical aura that made her hard to see, there and not there at the same time, flickering through space. She spun the sword in her palm carelessly once, twice, three times, then held it.

Arya shifted her stance, preparing her footing.

Cirilla opened her mouth. And then she started singing.

_“Oi Lazare, Lazare,”_

_What manner of spell is that?_

The ashen haired woman snapped her fingers. The bonfire blazed, flames climbed up to the sky. And then Cirilla attacked, and when she did Arya felt herself thrust in the middle of a hurricane. She couldn’t see where the attacks came from, couldn’t even think of striking back. All she could do was follow her instincts and protect herself with last-second blocking.

And all the while, the singing.

_“Tuka ni zaryazali…”_

She backed away, defending herself up, up, left, down, left, right –

A violent blow hit her knee at the same time her sword intercepted another, and she stumbled.

_“Kolko liste po gorak…”_

Yelling, Arya sliced blindly ahead of her, to no success. She called upon the forces of magic within her and chanted a spell that would make her faster. She sidestepped to avoid the fire, and feeling the energy reach her muscles, she gripped her sword tighter, her surroundings blurring around her.

_“Tolkos zdrave na taz kyshta...”_

The effects of her magic were null. As much as she had become faster, her enemy still seemed like lightening. There was clapping now, to accompany the song, and this mocking made Arya absolutely furious. She was fighting for her life, while the other was merely playing a game. She hadn’t felt this overpowered since the time Durza captured her.

_“Prevo tuka doydohme…Moma, momche naydohme…Ya momata godete… Ya momcheto zhenete”_

She was hit on the shoulder, on the hip, on the ribs. All the blows were blunt – with a sword’s pommel or flat, never with the edge, never fatal yet always painful. It wasn’t long before her sword was ripped from her hand. A knee hit her abdomen, pushing the breath out of her and throwing her back. She stumbled.

_“Lelele … lelele …lelele…”_

An elbow came down on her cheekbone, and she saw stars. A kick to her ribs, so hard she could hear a _crack_. She cursed. A powerful backhanded slap bust her lip open. Arya spat blood. She was grabbed by the hair and thrown. Her back hit a tree trunk, and she slid down to the ground, gasping for breath. She looked up.

Cirilla stood there, arms crossed, rubbing her knuckles, her blade sheathed on her back. Arya tensed when the woman took a step forwards. Then human stopped, smiled and bowed.

“Cirilla of Cintra, Lady of Worlds, at your service. Feel free to call me whenever you need another bashing.”

She _winked._

And then she vanished into thin air.

Arya grit her teeth. They hurt. She halfheartedly mumbled a healing spell and winced when the bones of her ribcage shifted positions. It was twenty minutes later when she dragged her sorry self back to where they had made camp. Cirila was lying down near the bonfire, sleeping. Arya considered stabbing her right then and there, then she considered running.

She thought better of it a split second after.

_I am in so much trouble._

But the magic had drained her down and her head still rung from the whacking. Cirilla wasn’t any more or less aggressive – to the contrary, she hadn’t even bothered to shackle her prisoner. Arya figured it would be fine to work things out in the morning. She kicked her bedroll open, laid down next to the fire and drifted into her waking dreams.


	4. Chapter 4

Ciri did not consider herself a very exigent person. Sure, she enjoyed luxuries as much as the next one. She liked shoes and pretty dresses, jewelry and make up, and even the occasional fancy noble ball, but she could live just fine without those things. She went across worlds with as little as the clothes she had on her, and was not into the habit of hoarding transdimentional souvenirs.

There were, however, small commodities she liked to have, one of which she currently held between her fingers: a ballpoint pen.

_Wonderful, practical little things, those are._

The sun was pleasantly warm against her skin, and the scent of fresh air was a treat to her lungs. She uncapped the pen and rested her back against a tree trunk, making herself comfortable. Then, she resumed taking notes on her booklet. The encyclopedia of the creatures of the multiverse was a project she'd had going for a long while, and this was the seventh or eighth notebook she filled with doodles and annotations.

 _The alagaesian elf,_ she wrote down right under 'the alagaesian urgal', then inked a quick sketch of Arya. _'The alagaesian elf is quite average as far as elves go. Pointy ears, good with magic, superiority complex, fairly unremarkable. See 'elves' for more information.'_

She crossed her legs and skipped some space, in case she wanted to go back and add something. She was about to move on to the unique species of rabbit she had spotted – and eaten – early in the morning, when her musings were interrupted by the landing of a gigantic blue dragon. Its weight made the ground shake and the impact lifted a cloud of dust that made Ciri cough.

From the beast's back, a boy no older than sixteen jumped down from a saddle, drawing his crimson sword as he moved. He was, of course, Eragon – the one she was meant to capture. King Galbatorix had warned her that by taking the elf, the boy and the dragon would follow, and she had obviously noticed their approach, so she wasn't really surprised. Still, she had been enjoying a fairly peaceful moment for a change.

The boy was now only a couple steps away from her, his hand tensely holding his blade, pointing it at her. Ciri slammed her notebook shut and grit her teeth with mild irritation.

"Plague take me, I hate Mondays," She declared, not hiding her general annoyance.

"Where is she?" Eragon snarled. His eyes had dark rings under them, and he looked disheveled and tired. He was also rather rude.

"Good afternoon," She snapped.

The boy took a step closer. "You can't escape us. We've had your tracks for three days now. You are surrounded. The elves are ready to leap into action, even if you somehow evade me…and Saphira."

The dragon growled in agreement.

_Absolute fucking bullshit. O gods above and below, grant me patience._

"Oh no." Ciri replied in a monotone. "I have been found. How could you have uncovered the trail I worked so hard to… wait, no, I didn't. Glad to know it took you five days to find me on a leisure stroll, I can now rest assured that I will never be caught if I start trying."

His ears turned pink at that, and she smiled maliciously.

_You are mean, Cirilla._

She grinned wider.

"Where is she?" Eragon insisted. "I'm going to give you one more chance to start talking."

The witcheress lifted her palms in a gesture of peace. "All right, all right, as you wish, sir. Right now, it's twenty two forty seven past midday, so she's probably applying her lilac and gooseberries perfume to attend court – oh, you mean the elf, not my mum? Silly me. She went to the village to buy bread. Did you know she's a vegetarian? Isn't that crazy?"

"Have you no fear for your life?" He growled. "You dare mock Eragon Shadeslayer? I who, defeated Durza? I, who dare defy the king?"

Ciri paled, her eyes wide, and swallowed dry. "My apologies, sir. I wasn't aware…but of course, the woman. Oh!" She moved her hand to her waist and patted the pouch strapped there, her fingers trembling, until she finally fished out something. "Damn! For a second I thought it was the elf I had forgotten here inside one of my pockets, but no. Just another ballpoint. My sincerest regrets, Eragon Shadeslayer."

It took him almost two seconds to realize she was making fun of him again – probably because he had never seen anything like a ballpoint pen in his life. Ciri mentally patted herself in the back for her convincing acting.

The dragon let out a stream of fire from her nostrils. The boy closed the distance between the them and pressed the tip of his sword dangerously against Ciri's neck. In an instant, without moving a muscle, she blinked herself right under a tree on the opposite side, her position unchanged except that she now faced Eragon's back. Moving her fingers in the air, she swiftly cast the sign of Aard.

The result was immediate, and the telekinetic blast erupted from her palm and tossed the boy face first against the tree she'd leaned against mere fractions of second before.

"If you point this thing my way again, I am going to shove it up to the hilt inside your arse. I mean it."

"She means it," Arya agreed as she appeared just over the hill, a bag slung over her shoulder. She ran the remaining distance between them, a look of legitimate worry on her face.

"Arya!" The boy exclaimed as he stood back up, bewildered. "Where –"

" _Fucking buying bread!_ " Ciri snarled exasperatedly, then took a deep breath and mentally counted to ten. She turned to Arya. "Is he daft? That's the man you're with? You should consider other options, you know – like me. One night stand, no strings attached. Guaranteed satisfaction."

The elf frowned, and the boy turned to stare at her with complete puzzlement.

"But you're a woman," he pointed out.

_So this world is one of those places_

"I'm warning you for your own good, lady elf," Ciri continued, ignoring Eragon's remark. "You see, Lara loving a human is precisely the reason my life turned to shit. I know it can be tempting, considering the elven -" She paused and lifted her hand, thumb down. "Plrrrrt. As opposed to the human -" Paused again and showed a considerable size with her outspread palms. "– and you would be absolutely right, I would know, but do open your mind to other possibilities, you might be pleasantly surprised."

Eragon gaped as she spoke, his cheeks quickly taking a crimson shade. Arya hid her face with her hands.

"Please, stop," The elf begged. "I think you've completely misunderstood –"

Ciri laughed. "All this is a big misunderstanding." She turned to the boy. "Our first meeting was rather abrupt, I admit, and the way I snatched your girlfriend away might have given you the impression I am holding her hostage, which I am not."

"She's not –"

Arya didn't let him finish, turning to face her. "Yes, you are."

"I am _not_. I'm holding the world hostage. There's a difference. A big difference. A few billion cubic kilometers of pure fucking difference. Hey, watch the sword. You think I'm scared of you just because you showed up with a dragon? Because you're wrong."

The dragon in question growled, small flames licking at its nostrils. Arya sighed and tossed the bag she'd been carrying on the ground, then sat down in the ground, picked up a loaf of bread and bit into it.

"Please, let us talk this out," The elf suggested. "Eragon, don't act like a fool. If this was a matter to be solved with brute force, I would have already escaped. You'll have to reason with her, because I'm not sure the three of us can take her down, together."

"You can't," Ciri informed.

The witcheress had met many people across the worlds that could go toe to toe with her. Dark figures like Corvo Attano and his daughter Emily Kaldwin. Powerful mages such as Merlin and Morganna, Gandalf the White, the Dragonborn from Tamriel, Inquisitor Trevelyan and the youngest Hawke from Thedas. And then there were also people with not a drop of magic to them that she still wouldn't want to cross, as was the case of the eldest Hawke sister and Commander Shepard.

She liked to think she knew how deep into trouble she was. She'd made mistakes when she was younger, grossly misjudged the danger in Bonhart, Vilgefortz and even Eredin, but she had learned and grown cautious from it. She knew what she was doing now.

_Maybe._

She still found very little to fear from the boy and the dragon. The elf was another story. The elf, she kept an eye on. Still the three couldn't beat her on raw power, that was for certain. Some worlds simply bred out shitty mages, and Alagaesia was one such place where the greatest magician had nothing on Triss Merigold hanging upside down from a dimeritium post.

The elf and the boy exchanged looks and the witcher medallion on her neck trembled, telling on their telepathy. Their mental communication ended with Eragon sitting down next to Arya, a look of distaste stamped in his face. Still sitting, Ciri teleported herself closer to the pair, snatched what remained of the bread from the elf's hand and stuffed it in her mouth. It tasted of raisins.

_Where did she get bread with raisins at this end of the world?_

Arya squinted and wordlessly picked up another loaf. Ciri swallowed the food and cleared her throat.

"Well, I suppose this is a good time as any for some much needed explanation," She conceded. "You two must be dying of curiosity about my mysterious…everything."

 _"You three,"_ A feminine voice inside her head corrected.

The witcheress recognized it the source of the voice as the dragon. "Oh, so you speak. Pleased to meet you, Ser dragoness."

_"Saphira. And of course I speak."_

Ciri shrugged. "The king didn't mention it and I didn't ask. I've met dragons that spoke through telepathy, dragons that spoke through their mouths and dragons that did not speak at all. I'll make sure to add 'sentience' to the section about 'alagaesian dragons' on my glossary. But for now, gather round you three, and I'll tell you a story."

And then she reached to them with her thoughts, because she had learned with Dandelion that a picture spoke more than a thousand words, and she prized herself very much on being able to spin a good tale.

 _"A story with illustrations,"_ She called out with her mind.

And then she began.


	5. Chapter 5

When her eyes first rested on Eragon and Saphira from afar, Arya had surprised herself feeling disappointment. Then she felt guilty for it, and then angry at herself for feeling guilty, because when she finally met her rescue, she admitted to herself that her predicament wasn’t all that bad. On the five days she’d been on the road, her feelings towards the situation went through a slow but steady change in perspective. Faölin had always told her to look for the silver lining, and to her it seemed that only after his death she could finally see what he meant.

And the truth, despite how she might have tried to deny it, was that it wasn’t so bad. She didn’t _really_ want to get back to Ellesméra and rejoin the war effort. She wasn’t in that much of a haste to go to the city and baby a naïve pubescent human and his dragon through the motions of becoming a rider. Besides, they were in good hands, people who would do a job much better than she could dream of.

Arya didn’t look forward to retelling the events following her capture over and over. She most certainly did not eagerly anticipate the awkward meetings with her mother, the tense politicking with the influential elven houses and the constant wordplay of her people. No, she had just lost her two best friends, one of whom so happened to be her lover. She had been captured and tortured, she had lived moments of pure horror and despair, followed by an insane battle against a being straight from hell and its army, and an equally mad rush across the country dragging a well-meaning but still irksome teenager and the last known female dragon.

What she desperately needed then was some rightfully earned self-time, to sit down and breathe and cry her eyes out without worrying about being judged, to curl up in a ball and baby herself and be left in peace for once. And once the initial stress of being kidnapped passed, after she admittedly got her behind handed back to her, she noticed that as far as abductors went, Cirilla was either a really good or a really terrible one, because she did not give much of a fuck about anything.

On the morning of the third day, after she had healed her sores and reassessed the situation, she had let herself fall behind pace, until she lost sight of the woman. Then she waited an hour, and two. When her concern about her captor’s wrath grew bigger than her desire to test the boundaries, she bolted ahead to find that the human didn’t seem to mind at all. Zireael didn’t even comment on her absence, just acknowledged her return with a nod.

On the afternoon of the third day, the seemingly random path they were taking took a semblance of familiarity. On the morning of the fourth day, Arya had no doubt they were following the route she, Faölin and Glenwing used to take when they were headed to Surda. She tested her realization by drifting a precise amount of steps north, then east, and sure enough, she met one of her old road headquarters.

The trio had built many such stops in their travels. This one was rather simple, merely a supply storage. She found the usual hidden stash of blankets and bread, but then her fingers brushed on something else and she tugged it out. It was a bottle of Faölin’s spiced faelnirv. The emotional blow was so abrupt and overwhelming, she sat down and sobbed her soul out until she ran out of tears.

               She lost track of time. The moon was high in the sky when she made her way back. Cirilla had unexpectedly stopped her march, and she found the woman waiting for her next to a campfire. She was offered a warm mug of “hot chocolate and s’mores”. She didn’t bother asking what that was, didn’t even go through the trouble of checking the thing for poisons.

                She drank hot chocolate and s’mores in silence with a human stranger. It was absolutely delicious. Then she dozed off in her bedroll, and pretended not to notice when the human threw a blanket over her meditative shape. She tried not to ask herself what kind of kidnapper tucked in their prisoners.

                On the morning of the fifth day, as she left camp to acquire bread in the nearby village, she was notified by the inner Faölin voice she so gently nurtured that she had in fact gone on forced vacations.

So she told herself that the resentment that arose when she first spotted blue glittering scales on the horizon was quite reasonable. After all, forced vacations were _still fucking vacations, damn you all._

Yet all that was quickly forgotten when Cirilla finally decided to open up and share her tale, because elves were curious creatures, young elves were _very_ _curious_ creatures, and Arya was a particularly inquisitive young elf. She had refrained from poking the woman’s consciousness until then, sure that it would cause trouble.

Over the years she’d worked as an ambassador, she had picked through many brains, and she had learned through practice to feel the gentle nuances of the minds of humans in particular. There were few things as intimate as telepathic contact, and with time she began to recognize the many facets of human character, some of which her elven mind struggled to understand. Their races shared so many emotions, yet they always came across so differently, it was always a delightful and exciting experience.

She tried to guess what she would find in Cirilla’s mind, the traits beyond the obvious. On the surface, the woman was proud, stubborn and hot-headed, but beyond that, she had hinted at a certain moral integrity. A little egocentric, Arya would say, though that was true for most of humanity. At times malicious, but not at all unkind.

_Not evil. Maybe misguided. Witty, borderline cynical. Dramatic. Confident._

What Arya did not expect was that Cirilla’s telepathic probe would be so clumsy, less of two minds touching and more of one mind tripping over and crashing on top of another. And she most certainly was not prepared for what she found when she finally rearranged her thoughts and reached back.

_She’s…not human?_

Even the most amateur of magic users could tell that the minds of humans and that of elves differed on a fundamental level. And so as soon as her being came in contact with Cirilla’s and she was overtaken by an explosive, energetic melody, the elf could tell that this woman was something else entirely.

_Human minds don’t sing. Elven minds do._

But what she felt crossing her soul like a bolt of thunder was definitely _not_ an elven tune. And that’s when the second insight struck her – she had heard it before. It was the song Cirilla had sung when they fought. That led Arya to the disturbing conclusion that their quarrel had taken place not only in the physical world but also between their wills, and that she had also been mentally overpowered.

_This music, though…_

She closed her eyes and let herself drift within it. A dangerous thing to do, but she’d learned in practice that the best way to understand an elven soul was to dance to its mind’s rhythm, even if she risked getting lost in it.

_And this is a soul easy to lose oneself to…fascinating._

It was so very different from anything she’d ever met before. The music of an elf’s essence was calm and quiet, languid even, like the waters of a lake – still, yet deep. Cirilla’s song was the ocean to that lake. Agitated and untamed, raging intense, it roared with so much energy and movement and _life,_ waves that rose and fell and crashed endlessly.

Arya swayed to the beat, and bits of thoughts began revealing themselves to her.

_“Know when fairy tales cease to be tales? When people start believing in them.”_

_“A bigger self-esteem!”_

_“…be called Cirilla of Vengerberg. Daughter of Yennefer.”_

It wasn’t easy for the elf to keep up with the tune, and her hands trembled, her breathing speeding up. She could almost taste the - _exertion? exhilaration? -_ the adrenaline in her blood.

_“Something ends, something begins.”_

Fishlike eyes. Terror. A black mare as fast as the wind. The irrevocable feeling of being pursued. An…unicorn? Pain, physical pain unlike anything she’d felt. Pain, emotional pain so strong it was physical. Love! Hatred, hatred. Distress. Despair.

_“The ouroboros. A snake that bites its own tail. Everything comes full circle.”_

Power. Power enough to tear worlds apart. Power enough to knock back even death. She had that power. She renounced it. Arya’s head hurt. She was sitting, yet she wavered. Her stomach churned.

_“Lady of Worlds. Lady of Time and Space. You cannot give up what is in your blood.”_

_“SOMETHING ENDS, SOMETHING BEGINS”_

It was too much. Arya withdrew, pulled her conscience away from that madness and wrapped it tightly around her own mind like a turtle retracting within its shell, waiting for the recoil. And the recoil did come, a snapped rope striking back wildly, and it hit her so hard she was knocked to the ground with a thud. She felt something warm on her skin and touched it. She looked at her fingers and they were wet with blood.

To her side, Eragon turned away and hurled.

“… sorry! I’m sorry. I let it get a bit out of control, I’m really sorry. Gods! Fuck, I’ve killed people with this before, I should have been more careful.”

To her credit, the woman looked legitimately regretful. Arya grunted. There were little bright spots dancing in her vision; she rubbed her forehead, her ears ringing. She spat. It came out red. Eragon fell down next to her and whined incomprehensibly.

“…I am so sorry, I should’ve known, Lady Yennefer never finished my magical education and –”

The elf halted her with an open palm. “It’s okay. It’s fine, really. Partly my fault, I too got carried away. I didn’t expect… are you of elven blood?”

Cirilla scratched her head absently. “It’s seven generations past me…one fourteenth elf. Maybe a bit more, there was some inbreeding between cousins. You can tell?”

“I can tell,” she confirmed.

_A hybrid! A real, living, human-elf hybrid!_

She’d be lying if she said she didn’t find that very thrilling. Though theoretically there were no reasons why elves and humans could not produce offspring, Arya had never met or even heard of any. She knew there must have been half-elves and quarter elves in the past, before the fall of the riders, yet the subject was taboo and the elves from Ellesméra were purists. She knew very few who wouldn’t be repulsed by the mere thought of mixing blood with the race of the king.

“Avallac’h and the elves used to call me Lara’s daughter,” Ciri admitted. “They refused to acknowledge a mere seven human lifetimes separating us.”

That…actually sounded like her people, yes. Passive-aggressive denial of unpleasant realities was a very elven thing to do, particularly if they were bitter over something, though Arya wasn’t yet sure where the resentment came from.

 _This is why Gilderien let her pass,_ she realized.

Eragon was still squealing on the ground, and she checked on his integrity with a wordless, delicate mental probe. The boy replied with an equally incoherent reassurance that he was fine. He wasn’t, but he would live, so she tipped Saphira to look after him – though she need not have – and focused back on the matter at hand.

“I’m a shit psionic, this was a terrible idea. I think it’ll be better for me to just tell you how it went, you’ll have to live without the pictures.”

The sensible part in Arya told her the woman was absolutely right, and normally the elf would have agreed, but this was an exceptional situation. Arya did not know if she would ever meet another part-elf, but it was highly unlikely. She didn’t want to let that chance escape, and she was willing to risk another blow for it.

_Even though I’m already way past the safe point._

She wiped her still bleeding nose with the back of her hand. “It’s not a bad idea at all. Let me help you, _I’m_ a good psionic. Just let me take the lead, here,” She sat cross legged and straightened up. Cirilla mimicked her pose, and the elf covered the human’s hands with her palms. The physical contact was not mandatory, but it helped the two telepaths tune in.

“…Ah, Eragon, maybe you should sit this one out.”

The boy grunted his agreement. Cirilla’s thumbs twitched against Arya’s fingers. The woman’s hands felt cold against the elf’s, and the latter realized she might be running a bit of a fever. It wasn’t unusual, after taking that kind of mental abuse.

_It’s fine. I’m fine. Let’s do this._

“Relax. Take it slow. Look at me in the eyes. Control your breathing…slowly, steady.”

The two exhaled together. The more Arya looked, the more she saw there was indeed a bit of elf in her – the sharp features, the high cheekbones, the distinctive ashen hair, the intense green eyes not unlike her own…

She was gently eased inside the other’s consciousness, this time sailing over her mind’s waves rather than being struck and washed away by them. The first thing that caught her attention was that music inside Cirilla’s soul had changed to something way less erratic, closer to elven yet not quite there. The remarkable thing however was the fact that it changed at all. An elf’s music hardly ever changed; it was tied to its true name, and told a lot about the individual.

 _“Hey. I think I got this.”_ Cirilla tested the telephatic link tentatively. _“Thanks. You’re right, I had to try again. You know, my dad used to tell me that if you fail at something, you have to do it again immediately after, else you –”_

_She was sitting in a bedside, talking to a gentle-looking woman with a mane of red hair and a look of mixed compassion and fury. She had sores and aches all over her overly bruised body._

_“…do it again immediately after, else you catch the fear! ”_

The transition to the memory was so abrupt Arya was left feeling dizzy. She hadn’t warned the woman that thoughts might trigger remembrances, and now all that was left to do was to watch it out.

_The objects around the room seemed large, but she understood that it was because Cirilla was at that time very small. She shared the child’s sentiments towards the redhead – Triss Merigold was her name. Young Cirilla admired that woman’s beauty, power and freedom, but the feelings were mixed with caution and a very small hint of fear. Adult Cirilla’s emotions took the shape of a much clearer sisterly affection._

_“And aren’t you afraid of anything?”_

_Arya felt the kid’s reluctance and fears as if they were her own._

_“I won’t tell anyone,” Triss insisted. Little Cirilla leaned in to whisper._

_“I’m afraid of two pendulums. At the same time.”_

The elf felt another memory coming and tried with no success to hold back the shift between one event and the other. Yet the two recollections were too strongly linked together and too intense to stop. Arya had taken a dive in that ocean, and now she would have to wait until she was washed ashore.

_A white haired man with the eyes of a viper. This time the child and the adult’s hearts agreed when they sang out trust, love and a bonding so strong it crossed time and space. The man was yelling out instructions that caused the child some frustration._

_They clutched a small sword tightly. Ahead of them there were the pendulums – not two, but three heavy logs with sharp edges, swinging back and forth over the edge of a mountain. The man barked out a command and they moved, dancing between the pendulums at speed that wouldn’t fall behind an elf’s. They dodged the first, pirouetted away from the second and leapt over the last one on pure reflex._

_Success! Triumph! Arya was a little girl who turned back excitedly to receive her father’s approval. The skin around those strange slit eyes crinkled a little with a sincere smile. Her chest burst with pride._

_“You forgot to strike.”_

Arya tensed when she sensed the third event linked to that chain of remembrance. It loomed over like a tsunami to those waves, huge, overwhelming and unstoppable. The elf braced herself, knowing it would be useless, knowing it was too late to withdraw and she would just have to suffer whatever came through.

She was still not ready when it hit.

_FEAR!_

_Despair, hopelessness, pain. Their legs were weak as they backed away. Panic, utter panic, ice running through their veins as the large figure with fishlike eyes approached. The one in this memory was a child no longer, yet she feared so deeply it reached animalistic instincts._

_They dodged, they backed, they parried. There were tears in their cheeks._

_Memories began to overlap – a whip, a large arena, chains and torture tools, physical and verbal abuse, her blade held over her own heart. Crying, crying, blood and guts and feces and urine spilled on the dirt ground and so, so much heartbreak. A tower, a lake, a prison with no escape. An elven king, a choice that is no choice at all, a monarch’s undesired touch. Humiliation. Escape. Hands disfigured by cruelty. A chair ready to hold her in degrading position. A glass tube._

“Hold it, hold it!” Arya commanded out loud. Her fingers trembled, and it took her a split second to realize the source was not her own muscles. She squeezed the woman’s hands. “Hold it, Ciri, calm down, focus –! ”

_Backing away to shaky support beans, the man – Bonhart, oh how she hated him, how she quaked at his sight – following her into narrow wooden boards over a bottomless pit. Death, death, she had gone to other world to flee him, and yet there he was, always at her heels and she was so damn terrified –_

_“Hey, hey!”_ Arya called inside her head to no response. It wasn’t the first time she’s witnessed someone lose themselves in a memory like that, the past and present selves melting together, and not once did she fail to snap them back to reality. She was not willing to let this be the first time.

_“HEY. YOU.”_

She let go of Ciri’s hands and grabbed her shoulders, then she swung and bashed their foreheads together in a single smooth movement. She gritted her teeth with the impact.

“Motherfu –” The woman cursed.

Their mental connection shimmered. Arya felt the woman’s thoughts go into disarray, memories and emotions scattering wildly. The elf didn’t hesitate. She couldn’t hope to seize control of the other’s thoughts and tame that savage soul, so she did the next best thing – clutched firmly at Ciri’s consciousness and withdrew to her own mind, dragging the other with her, back to her safe haven, back to the gentle hum of her own music and the peace of the Tialdarí Hall she kept inside her.

An elf’s head was a dangerous place for a human, yet Arya had the feeling that this one would be just fine. She was right.

_“ – whoa.”_

_“You have a very turbulent mind,”_ she commented, letting waves of inner peace sweep over her guest. _“Damn! I’m an outstanding telepath.”_

A wave of wit mixed with undisguised gratitude. _“You’re a superb telepath. I…I don’t want to do this again.”_

She felt a throbbing pain in her already bruising forehead. _“Agreed. It would be wise for you to refrain from using telepathy, at least until you get better control over it.”_

_“Eh. Probably never. I’ll just add it to my list of gifts I can’t control. I’ve mastered the space-time hops at least, so it’s something.”_

_“Ciri…can I call you Ciri?”_

_“…I suppose.”_

Her hands were still on the human’s shoulders. She gave them a comforting squeeze.

_“It’s a powerful thing you have there, Ciri. Lots of potential...to defend yourself… If it is your wish, I could instruct you…”_

The woman replied with a mental snort. Arya hadn’t known one could so visually express contempt through telepathy.

_“What’s the catch? That I use it in your favor to topple the king? I’m not like that boy and his dragon. I am not a tool. You’d do well to remember that.”_

The elf smiled, inwardly and outwardly both. _“Would you believe in an offer of generosity? Empathy? From someone who’s touched your mind and seen you from what you are?”_

_“No.”_

This time Arya laughed out loud. _“Take it as an apology, then. I’m sorry for how you were received in Ellesméra. And I’m sorry for… what was done to you by my people’s hands. I want to hear the whole story from you, with words this time. But before that… stay a little longer. Get to know me. Would you like a tour?”_

_“…Why?”_

_“Honestly? I’m very curious about you. It would be the first human to get to know me like this. Your race tends to lose their minds when in contact with ours, but you seem fine.”_

_“I’m not an experiment, you condescending shit. Fuck off.”_

Arya didn’t reply. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Ciri did not break the link, but did not probe further either.

_“…Ciri.”_

_“Yes?”_

_“It’s going to be really hard for us to be friends, isn’t it?”_

The woman interrupted the link between the two abruptly. Arya opened her eyes, and saw the other give her a sly half smile. Ciri cleared her throat and spared Eragon and Saphira a look to let them know they were done. She immediately felt the familiar touch of the boy’s telepathy reach her, but before they could initiate a dialogue, the woman spoke.

“It’s hard to tell when this story begins, but I’m going to start seven years before my birth, when the witcher Geralt of Rivia first arrived upon my grandmother’s court… ”


	6. Chapter 6

 

When the strange white-haired woman began her story, Eragon was in a sour mood. His head hurt brutally from her mental abuse, his nose felt stuffy and his ears rung. She had apologized for that, but not for how she’d shoved him face-first into a tree, or how she’d kidnapped Arya, or for her overall rudeness towards him, the queen of the elves and everyone else.

He had half a mind to stab her, but the cautious part of him was strongly against that, and besides, the elf had already warned him off.

_“Let it slide, little one,”_ Saphira commented, sending him a wave of restraint. _“We will show her why she should fear us later. For now, know your enemy.”_

“It all boils down to this: this place –” She gestured openly with her hands “ – is the only world you know, but not the only one that exists. There’s an infinity of them, many planes and universes in which I was born with the gift to freely roam. Here and now are not my place and not my time.”

“You mean to say,” Eragon began cautiously, “That you’re not from this world?”

“Not from this world, not from this time, not from here at all.” The white-haired woman absently crossed her outstretched legs and stared at the sky. “I am merely fulfilling my wanderlust.”

_“Is she mad?_ ”, he mentally nudged Saphira. The dragon echoed his feelings of skepticism. Arya however seemed to buy that story, much to his bewilderment.

“Where are you from?” the elf questioned, her face betraying nothing.

“My world is…not very far. I have no idea how to explain to you the difference between a dimension that is away and one that is close, but this… this was definitely a short hop. I didn’t need to do any stopovers between my world and here. It’s a close trip. On the same circle of the spiral…”

She trailed off.

_“Eragon,”_ Saphira called his attention. _“Do you think that maybe, if she’s telling the truth...she did mention meeting other dragons…?”_

_“I think she’s mad,”_ he replied. _“But hope is always worth it.”_

“You’ve met other elves,” Arya stated. It wasn’t a question.

“Yes.”

“Have you met –” Eragon queried, but was interrupted.

“Yes. Yes, yes and yes. Yes to that also. Whatever you can think of, yes. And then a lot of things you _can’t_ think of….” Cirilla tore her eyes from the sky and turned her intense stare at him. “I’ve seen some shit.”

He couldn’t resist the urge to and prod Arya’s mind any longer.

_“Arya, if she’s telling the truth, there could be more dragons –”_

_“Oh, she is,”_ the elf replied cryptically. _“That is far from the problem at hand here. Tread carefully with this one, Eragon. Very, very carefully...Don’t be fooled. This is a wolf in human skin, quick to anger and quicker to bite.”_

He hadn’t taken much from Cirilla’s mind – just one heavily packed punch of feelings and indistinct images that he could not make apart. He chose to trust the elf’s judgment on it once more, if only because they’d had more time together.

There was a clicking sound and the woman’s hand moved instinctively to a cat-shaped necklace in her throat, which emitted a subtle but definite vibration. The expression on her face turned to an irritated frown. Her thumb rubbed the metallic feline steadily. She bared her teeth on reflex.

“Do you two have anything you’d like to share? I’m starting to feel excluded here. Don’t think I don’t notice when you use telepathy right under my nose, because I do.”

He inhaled sharply and gritted his teeth, resisting the urge to ask the elf if what the woman had said was even possible. She warned him off with an incisive glare.

“Come back with us to Ellesméra,” Arya suggested abruptly. The offer got Cirilla off guard, and she arched her eyebrows in disbelief.

“Riiiight… I don’t think so. I’m arrogant, not stupid. There’s no way I’m going back to that elven… _lair_. They flower-eaters received me so well the first time, I’m surprisingly not filled with the desire to return. Not after kidnapping their princess, no, I won’t.”

Eragon had to admit she had a point. He had snuck out in the night to chase after the two, against the wills of Oromis and the queen, and he was very much concerned about what kind of punishment he would receive when he got back. Whatever penalty the kidnapper would get for taking Arya was bound to be much, much worse.

“You’ll be my guest this time,” the elf insisted.

“Guest in your cells, more likely,” Cirilla huffed.

“We don’t have cells in Ellesméra,” the other countered.

“Is that supposed to be comforting?!”

Arya crossed her arms. “This is not fair. I’ve done nothing to earn your mistrust. I didn’t run away, I didn’t poison your food, I didn’t stab you while you slept.”

“Because you know better!”

The elf stood up brashly and pointed a finger at her captor. “ _You_ said, and I quote, that you wanted to –” She flicked her index fingers in the air “’make friends’ with me. Well I’m trying. You, on the other hand, are not. At all. I don’t know why you bother to put on this show if you’re not willing to give me a chance.” She paused and wavered for a split second, then spat on the ground and snarled. “Fuck you and your racist shit. You’re just as bad as the elves you want to hate, and then some worse – need I remind you that you share _our_ blood? Do you think about that when you feed your ridiculous prejudice? When you try to squeeze all of us in your small-minded preconceptions?”

Eragon gaped. In all the time he’d known the elf, she’d been nothing but perfectly controlled, downright stoic. This kind of outburst was an entirely new side of her he’d never imagined.

_And she told me to tread carefully!_

There was a tense moment of silence, then Cirilla burst out laughing. “Oh, I like you. I don’t trust you for a second, but I like you. Very well, have it your way. Just remember –” She pointed to one emerald eye with her index finger, then the other. “Both eyes for an eye. All teeth for one tooth. I don’t payback equally. I don’t play fair.”

She stood, hesitated, tapped her foot on the dust. “…but. But, you’re right. I have been acting based on bias, and for that I am sorry.”

Eragon blinked.

_“What…was that about? After you told me to be careful, too!”_

To his surprise, her reply was filled with mild amusement. _“Some people can be reasoned with…and some people need more. Emotions. Sincerity. A display of humanity. Mmm. I don’t deny I enjoyed the venting, though. Refreshing, for a change. What? I do have feelings, you know.”_

Cirilla cleared her throat loudly. “Rude,” she pretended to cough. “Rude, rude.”

It definitely _seemed_ like she could tell when they traded thoughts, he mentally complained to no one in particular.

“So are you,” Arya pointed out.

“Ooh. Careful there. I might give you a bat nose to match your bat ears.”

The elf’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “Thus proving my point?”

“I have a _terrifying_ reputation to keep. Well?” She extended a hand. “Are we going to the city or not?”

“Saphira can’t carry the three of us,” Eragon explained. “Someone will have to walk –”

“Oh, please,” Cirilla rolled her eyes, then forcefully grabbed his wrist with one hand and Arya’s shoulder with the other. “Someone make contact with the dragon – thank you, Arya. Let’s go.”

And then, before he could protest, the world shimmered around them, and there he was.

 

\---

 

“Aaand spot on again!” Ciri cheered, opening the heavy wooden door with mirth.

There were three seconds of delay between the moment Cirilla entered the chamber and the moment her memories returned.

_Returned? Arrived?_

Arya’s head brutally whipped back as if punched. She would have fallen down if she had been standing, but she was kneeling, kneeling in front of her mother –

A droplet of red stained the carefully polished wooden floor, and her hand moved to her dripping nose.

“Identify yourself immediately!” The queen demanded of the intruding stranger, and the déjà vu hit Arya so hard, white spots danced on her vision. To her side, she heard Eragon retch.

“I think I rather have your daughter identify me, my queen,” A horrifyingly familiar voice called back.

The elf closed her eyes for a moment, letting whatever the fuck was happening in her brain settle down. She knew the white-haired woman that had just invaded the meeting, she knew her, she knew Cirilla of Cintra as the part-elf who snatched her away for five days and took her on the Ellesméra-Surda route, who fed her ‘hot chocolate and s’mores’, the otherworldly woman with absurd telepathic powers who agreed to come with her to Ellesméra…

Yet that could not be, because, because –

“It’s Wednesday,” she groaned, then muttered a quick spell to dull the pain assaulting her temples. “It’s Wednesday,” she repeated, then opened her eyes and stood to face the newcomer. “Our first day in the city. I know you. We’ve met – we’ve met –”

_On the way to the city?_

Confusion. That was not it, she knew that was not it, yet that must have been it, because –

“Daughter?” The queen urged.

“On the way to the city,” She mumbled. “We met on the way here –”

“Ah-ah,” Ciri interrupted. “The mind of the subject will desperately struggle to create memories where none exist…”

_What in the name of the Menoa is she talking about –?_

She was dizzy. She leaned against the wall for support. “We’ve met,” She repeated. “In the future. We will meet – will have met – oh, by the sun and stars! She’s my guest, mother, leave her be for a moment while I –”

Islanzadí stood. The metallic sound of a blade being drawn rung in the room. “What did you do to my daughter and my rider?”

Cirilla raised both her hands in a sign of peace. “My Queen, I assure you –”

“What did you do?!” Arya hissed briskly, stepping towards the white-haired woman. She grabbed the other by the shoulders “ _What did you do?!_ ”

“Nothing,” Ciri replied blankly. “It is Wednesday, Arya. I haven’t done anything.”

“You haven’t done – you haven’t done… _Holy fucking Menoa!_ ”

The human answered her with a genuinely friendly smile. “Yes.”

“You didn’t just bring us across space. You brought us across time. It’s Wednesday. By the powers of the forest around me, you can actually… three people and one _dragon_ …”

“I just didn’t want to take your time. You are at war, after all, and it’s always such a rush. It didn’t feel very fair to interrupt Eragon’s training…”

“…And now there’s nothing I can accuse you of, either. You literally haven’t done anything.” The elf contemplated that for a second. “Well, I’ll be… I wasn’t planning anything. I really wasn’t planning anything against you, Cirilla, I had no traps to spring. I had honestly planned on offering you my welcome…”

“I see no impediments. I didn’t lie. I took you to your destination, and I gave you the time you were so short on.”

“You didn’t lie, and yet… I can’t help but feel...”

“Outwitted?” Ciri offered. “Foiled? Thwarted? Cheated?”

Mostly, she felt confused; her mind was having a hard time keeping chronology straight. She wanted to be mad, but the rational part of her kept reminding her that it didn’t make sense to be angry at something that hadn’t happened yet.

She was actually a little bit in awe. It was such a brilliant move, she couldn’t even figure out what to feel.

“I’m sorry,” The witcheress muttered. “It was inconsiderate, I know, but I couldn’t take that risk. I don’t regret it…but I am sorry nonetheless.”

“You are more of a goddamn elf than you can possibly imagine,” She muttered, then wiped her nose with the back of her palm.

“Would anyone care to explain to me what is going on?” The queen interrupted. “Have you or haven’t you met? Daughter? Who is this person?”

“She’s… a friend… I think. Her name is Cirilla, _Zireael,_ the Swallow. We’ve met...will have met…”

“Don’t overthink it,” Ciri suggested.

“She took you,” Eragon spoke up. “She took you. Kidnapped you, would have taken you to the king – what – how –”

“Don’t overthink it,” Ciri repeated.

“You work for the usurper?” Islanzadí hissed.

“Ah, allow me to clear this up then, my Lady” Ciri stepped forward and bowed her head. “He speaks the truth, in that I have indeed dealt with Galbatorix himself. He offered me a large sum to bring him your daughter and…your rider…” She bit her bottom lip with a look of genuine regret. “I was blinded, my queen, by my resentment towards the elven kind… yet your daughter has proved me wrong in many ways. She has shown me that there is good in …our people. She made me feel welcome, my lady, by inviting me to the city as her guest…to embrace my past, my culture and my elven blood. ‘Tis the truth, milady; you daughter will confirm it if you trust me not.”

_Snake. The temper of a wolf, and the tongue of a viper._

“She is of elven blood,” Arya agreed. “As for my hospitality…I believe I haven’t offered it yet.”

_We can play this game two ways, Lady of Worlds._

Cirilla’s eyes widened with surprise, then her lips cracked a genuine smile. The woman bowed her head in acknowledgement, strands of ashen hair hiding the ugly scar on her cheek for a second.

The queen crossed her arms tensely. “I can see it. The eyes, the cheekbones. You’re no halfling though, I can tell. How many generations past are you?”

“Seven, your highness.”

Islanzadí sighed. “It was bound to happen…with the elven riders so openly roaming amongst the mortal kind. I did not know any of you survived the fall, but it does not surprise me. Seven generations… there’s not much elf left in you, yet I can hardly deny your ancestry. Not when you so fluently mastered our language, either… alas, it matters not. I am forbidden by the law to submit you to any test I would not submit an elf, Zireael, but these are times of war, and you’ve openly declared to have worked for the enemy. I trust my daughter’s judgment, yet I would have you swear fealty to me, if you want to stay.”

Arya tensed. She had mixed feelings on people swearing fealty to her mother. For a moment, she considered mentally warning Cirilla that an oath made on the Ancient Language was magical and binding and that it could not be revoked. She chose to stay silent instead. She was not even sure it would actually work, not with someone from another world, not with someone so peculiar.

_It is better that way. Safer that way._

“That would be no problem at all, my Queen.”

“Then repeat these words with me: I swear…”

Many things happened at once. Cirilla opened her mouth to repeat the words, and the cat medallion on her neck vibrated. The human closed her mouth immediately, pressed her lips together and coughed. Arya and no one else in that room could tell that it was a fake cough. Arya and no one else saw that when Cirilla cleared her throat and formally put her hands behind her back, two of her fingers deftly hooked on something inside the satchel on her belt.

Arya and no one else paid much attention to the metallic thing she rubbed between her fingers when she repeated her mother’s words, nervously shifting from foot to foot. No one in that room knew humankind as much as she did, and no one in that room knew that particular human as well as she did either. They would see her fiddling as a sign of anxiety and apprehension, of human insecurities towards the elven magnificence.

Arya saw it for what it was.

When Cirilla of Cintra first opened her mouth to repeat the queen’s words, Arya was not entirely sure that they would be binding. But when the woman actually spoke them, her thumb, index and middle fingers pressed against the magic-suppressing dimeritium shackles on her satchel, the elf was sure that oath would not hold at all. Yet she did not protest, did not voice her concern.

She wasn’t the least worried that the witcheress would betray the city to the king, wasn’t even worried that she’d kidnap her again and haul her to Uru’baen. With Cirilla, her concerns were others. With that woman, Arya felt different things were at stake.

_This is my game,_ the elf thought to herself. _My game, and hers. She plays for amusement. She plays out of boredom._

Green eyes met similar ones and she caught a flash of Ciri’s sly lopsided smile. She found herself reciprocating it. She had a politician’s blood and heart in the end, and it was hard not to enjoy this game they were playing. She relished her adversary, appreciated the unique mindset – the intensity of a human, the malice of an elf.

_I play for the thrill. I play for the novelty._

“Welcome to Ellesméra,” The queen voiced, albeit halfheartedly.

Their audience stood, clapped their hands. The gates to the city were pushed open, and elves of all kind came down from where they had been sitting to greet them. She was soon swarmed by strangers and questions of all kinds, queries whose answers she dodged expertly with half-truths and flatteries that flowed from her tongue as easily as the drinks flowed in.

_Monotonous. Repetitive. Tiresome. Slow. So very slow._

She’d been with elves and dwarves, but it was the human politics she enjoyed the most. Bold, daring, aggressive – perfect for those ridiculously short and proportionally intense little lives they lived. And once Arya got a taste of a challenge, it was very hard for her to let go.

She caught a wink of round emerald eyes at some point. She still wasn’t sure what that meant, but this time, she winked back.

 


	7. Chapter 7

“Don’t like forests,” The ashen-blond mumbled grouchily. “Don’t like tree houses. Don’t like mornings. Don’t like elves. Stupid Mondays. Stupid elf city. Stupid –”

“What, pray tell, do you like?” Arya cut her short as the two made their way through the weaving wooden steps of Ellesméra.

“Mmm.” Ciri sped up her steps to keep pace. “Naked women.” She counted the items with her fingers. “Large amounts of gold. Naked men. That gurgling sound my enemies make when I sever an artery…Oh, and sledding!”  She paused for a moment. “In that order.”

_One of those is not like the others_

“…I too enjoy sledding,” the elf replied. “A pity it doesn’t snow in the forest.”

“Stupid elf city,” she repeated. “Stupid forest. Don’t like –”

“Yes, I believe you’ve made yourself rather clear,” Arya snapped.

“ – fucking tree-huggers.”

She took a sharp turn right and Ciri followed, grabbing on a tree trunk for balance as the climb got steeper. She was cutting the human some slack because the path they were taking was indeed a rough one, better suited for elves already familiar with it –

“Fucking mountain goat trail!! This better be damn worth it.”

 _Or mountain goats,_ she conceded.

“Does your resentment have any particular source?” Arya queried, ignoring her companion’s unscrupulous cursing.

“Almost got turned into a dryad once. Let me tell you, the moment they brought me the memory-wiping holy water bowl was the moment I knew I was _not_ suited for this…tribal life!”

 A “dryad”, Arya knew, was a creature of human myth that had its roots traced back to the first round-ears who arrived in Alagaesia and saw elves – females in particular – dancing and singing for the forest. She refrained from mentioning this however, because she was always acutely aware of Cirilla’s alien origins, and because she saw an opportunity to be treated with a nice story.

“How did you get out of it? Or into it, for that matter?”

“I was very little back then, seven or eight, and my grandmother had set me up to meet this creepy old king…” she trailed off.

“Ah. Arranged marriages.” The elf sympathized. “Had a fair share of those myself...”

Ciri turned to face her, a twinkle in her shining green eyes. “Did you ever get married?”

The elf smiled with mischief. “Did you?” She shot back.

Ciri laughed. “Point taken, elf-princess.”

She rolled her eyes. “Didn’t think so. So, how did you dissuade the king?”

They were almost on their destination now, and the trail was getting slightly easier. Arya took the lead when the path was too narrow for the two of them to pass through.

“Ran away right under his big fat nose! Out of the castle and into the nearby woods. He sent his men after me but they all got killed inside the forest. It was filled with traps, one wrong step and bang! Dead. I roamed that dryad forest for hours.”

“I thought you never got lost,” Arya pointed out.

“Aha! You see, I wasn’t lost. Not at all. I was walking right towards my destiny. It was the first time I met my dad then, in those woods. He was passing by and he found me just in time to save my sorry behind from this horrendous insectoid creature the size of a boar –”

“We’re here.”

The two stopped talking for a moment to take in the landscape. The Stone of Broken Eggs was not the highest peak of Ellesméra, but it was the most historically significant one, and she had a feeling that even the human could sense that when they finally laid foot on its peak. The dragons of old hadn’t chosen that place for nothing; below them, the forest spread as far as the eye could see, bits of it occluded by clouds that reflected the sunlight.

“A pity,” she whispered. “We missed the sunrise.”

“Nah.” Ciri grabbed her shoulder abruptly and the world blurred around her. Arya clenched her teeth and shut her eyes, fighting a wave of vertigo. When she opened them, the sun had crawled back down, filling the sky with striking hues of red and orange. The distinct sensation of having nails hammered into her skull assaulted her as memories overlapped. Her stomach moved into a knot, and she wiped with her sleeve a thin line of blood that ran from her nose.

“There you go,” The human stated.

“Don’t do this so lightly,” Arya complained, her voice feeble.

“What? Time hops? Oh, I’m sorry,” She replied sheepishly, noticing the elf’s discomfort. “They stop happening eventually – the nosebleeds and headaches, I mean. It just takes some getting used to, both the body and the mind.”

“Mhhm.” The elf sat down near the edge of the peak, the wind nipping at her skin. “We have rules, you know? Rules of magic. You can’t bring back the dead. You can’t undo a spell that was cast. And you can’t turn back time. Your trivial breaking of the last rule is a little bit disturbing.”

“Hah,” Ciri grinned, taking a seat next to her. “There are no rules to magic where I come from. Just a price…always a price. There was a point in my young years in which I had the power to do _anything._ ” She paused and reflected on that for a moment.

“What happened?” Arya pressed when the other didn’t continue.

“The price was too high. I gave the power up. Nowadays I just travel through space and time and cast the occasional Sign. And since that’s all I do, I might as well be opulent with it.”

Arya stared off at the slowly rising sun, watching the growing shadows cast by the tallest of Du Weldenvarden’s trees. “You talk as if it was a small feat. It is not. What you can do…truly astounding. I wouldn’t believe it if I hadn’t experienced it myself.”

“It is little in face of what I could do…what I _can_ do, if I’m willing. Which I’m not. I am also not willing to keep talking about it, so drop the topic, will you please?”

She did. It wasn’t as if she was short on things to talk about with this woman. Arya was still not sure why she’d brought Cirilla there. The Stone of Broken Eggs was a place the elves avoided because of the dark memories it brought, but those were memories Arya did not have. The war with the Dragons was long in the past when she was born, and she had always been a bold child.

The rules imposed by taboos had very little hold on her, and she soon found out that this was one of the locations she could go for a moment of meditation and thought. More so than the gardens of Tialdarí Hall, the Stone was a place of true, absolute solitude, for it was a place hardly anyone dared to visit.

_This is a place of things we would like to forget._

“I used to come here when I wanted to be…”

She stopped. She was going to finish it off with ‘alone’, but that didn’t quite cut it.

“Isolated?” Ciri offered.

“Isolated. Lonely…forgotten. Neglected. Small.”

The wind howled, and for a moment the elf wondered if the other had heard her hushed words at all.

“Such gloom,” Ciri replied in a mild tone.

The wind blew harder, and Arya shivered. The sun had just crept its way over their legs, yet the temperature was steadily dropping. She muttered a spell to make herself warmer and considered extending it to the woman next to her.

“This place has history,” She began. “Um, would you like…” She gestured vaguely. “…a spell to warm you up? You said you don’t do magic and it’s getting a little chilly, so I was wondering…”

She pressed her lips together in a thin line. Arya considered herself quite good with words – she was a diplomat, _damn it_ , but even she still hadn’t completely mastered the manners of idle chatter with part-elf otherworlders.

Ciri turned to face her, tilting her head slightly, a sly smile tugging at her lips. “Why this is very kind of you, Arya, thank you, but I’m a northerner, I’m used to the chill. Though I wouldn’t object if you were to warm me up…in another way.”

They locked eyes and Ciri winked, making the elf break eye contact and recoil a little in confusion, her cheeks involuntarily flushed _from the cold._

She blinked, trying to put her thoughts back in order. She understood that kind of behavior coming from human men. She could even see it coming from elven men who were either very immature or very audacious. The key word being “men” _._

_Is she trying to throw me off my game?_

“So, right when the big bug was off to get me, Geralt showed up and squished it.” Ciri picked up the story where she’d left off. “Then this dryad found us and she took us to her queen, who was going to have me made into one of them. It was only when I took a drink of their memory wiping water and came off unscathed that they accepted I was not meant to be theirs.”

“Your relationship with your father eludes me,” Arya admitted.

“I’m adopted,” The blonde explained. “I’m what we witchers call a child-surprise. The man who sired me, I only met much later. Our relationship is… shaky at best. He’s not so bad… for an emperor, I guess, though he _did_ initially plan to marry me.”

“That’s… unsettling.”

The witcheress shrugged. “He changed his mind when he saw me, chose to set me free instead. He could have had me, back then. I suppose I never got the chance to see him as a father. Fate just tied me to someone else.”

“You talk a lot about fate,” Arya pointed out. “You know, I don’t really believe in that.”

Ciri stretched her arms out lazily, fists closed, sleeves sloppily rolled up to the elbows, then covered her nape with her palms in a laidback stance.

“Humor me.”

“The future is what we make of it now,” the elf explained. “There is such thing as free will, nothing is set in stone. Dwarves and humans, they believe in gods and prophecies that are worded vaguely enough to always come true. But there’s just no evidence for it.”

For a long while, there was silence between the two. Arya watched closely the expression of deep thought in the other’s face.

“That’s not what destiny is about,” Ciri finally spoke. “It’s just really hard for me to put into words.”

“That is true for most mysticisms,” she provoked.

“Also true for most of modern physics,” The witcheress snapped back. “You see, destiny is just a way of saying ‘ _it’s already done.’_ ”

“I’m afraid I don’t follow.”

The human crossed her arms and leaned forward. “You say the tomorrow is an empty canvas, yes? That it’s no destiny if you choose to have an apple for breakfast. What I’m trying to tell you is, you already did. You already chose. You already ate.”

“And you say that based on…?”

The blonde’s green eyes twinkled. “On the fact that I can hop a month into the future. And if I do, if I choose to cross time and appear a year from now, then the future turns into the past, and whatever you will do tomorrow, whatever you will do next Monday…”

“It’s already done.” The elf finished. “Wow.”

“Wrap your mind around that for a moment,” Ciri teased. “Welcome to my life.”

“Things can change, though,” She argued. “You would know that best. You can go back and change my mind about eating the apple.”

“Sometimes. Sometimes not. There are constants and variables.” The blonde stared off into space. “I met this girl once, Max, she could do little space-time hops too, and she just wanted to keep her friend alive. Except said friend was _already dead_ , so she kept getting killed over and over. She was saved from getting shot, then got ran over. She was saved from getting run over, ended up stabbed instead. She was saved from the stab, got attacked by a dog. Saved from the dog… well, you get the gist of it. Max went back five years and she still couldn’t change that one death.”

Arya crossed her legs, shifting her stance.

“How do you know, then, what can be changed and what can’t? How do you know what battles to pick?”

Ciri shrugged. “I don’t, I just go for it. I usually find out I was trying to change a constant when things start to crash and burn. And boy, do they burn. Don’t you have an appointment at eight? It’s seven thirty-six now.”

“I do,” the elf replied, standing up.

The human stared down at the abysm below them, legs swinging. Then she grinned. “You go on ahead, I’ll be…”

“You’ll be…?” Arya prompted.

“Trying to pick between paraglider and wingsuit,” The other muttered to herself. “What a spot, what a spot.”

“Between a …what?”

Arya expected no answer as she made her way down, and she got none.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Gaaaaaay

“…And here is where they’re getting Eragon some sword training.”

Ciri heard but didn’t really listen to the elf’s words as they strolled along the monotonous forest background. She leaned against the wooden railing that surrounded the deck they stood in and looked down, to where the metallic sounds of swords clashing were coming from.

She scanned the battle below her with cool nonchalance, observing the brown-haired boy trade blows with the lanky elven instructor. “Trade blows” was in fact quite the euphemism – Eragon was having his ass handed to him. On the third time his reddish blade was violently yanked from his hands, Ciri let out a deep, displeased sigh.

“He’s such a child, Arya, it’s a cruelty what you are doing to him here, and I want you to know that I strongly disapprove.”

The elf leaned forward and rested her crossed arms on the railing next to her. “You mean the sword training?” At the blonde’s incisive silence, Arya continued. “We did not start this war, Ciri, and it is his choice to fight.”

“You did, and this very typical sense of moral superiority makes me want to smack you,” The witcheress shot back.  “I wish you’d admit it to yourself, if not to the world, that you are in fact nothing more than terrorists. You are the bad guys here.”

“This is the kind of offense that could get you a harsh punishment in certain places,” Arya warned. “If it was Nasuada and not I, you’d get a whipping for this kind of contempt.”

The witcheress scoffed. “I am a child of contempt, Arya, born of wars like this one you are brewing out of pettiness and revenge. So stick your empty threats up you know where and try to see how twisted this is.”

“You are a very difficult person, Zireael, and I’m not sure why I stand your disrespect.”

_You’re into me and you just don’t know it yet._

“Perhaps because deep down you know I am right. Don’t think so? Then beat me up in honest argumentation. Why are you fighting?”

“Because Galbatorix is a menace. He is mad and out of control. He killed all the dragons and riders he could get his hands on, then locked himself in his castle for years to study his dark magics.”

“And I suppose he did that out of a whim?” Ciri ironized.

Arya grit her teeth. “He couldn’t take the denial of his request for a new dragon when his was killed, so he took it upon himself to steal one and take revenge on all who didn’t cave in to his whim.”

Ciri lifted her open palm, giving the elf pause. “So, let me put this in perspective. He had his dragon, this rational creature he raised from an egg to adulthood, this sentient being to whom he was telepathically bound, murdered right in front of his nose.”

The elf narrowed her eyes, but didn’t interrupt.

“So he goes back to the order of the Riders, an organization in which the power is evenly distributed between human and elves, and no rivalries and mobbing at all exist between the races, can you guarantee me that’s how it was?”

Arya opened her mouth to protest, but the witcheress cut her off.

“So he gets there, maddened by grief, and in despair he begs those elders and masters to replace what can never be replaced.” The blonde opened her arms, embracing the air, and cynically smiled. “He gets a kind denial because of his unstable mental state, with the promises that once he is better he will certainly have another chance, and of course they provide him with all the comprehension needed to help him get through his loss.”

By then Arya had straightened up her back and was in the process of turning a peculiar shade of pink.

“There was never any kind of imbalance in numbers between humans and elves in the order,” Ciri concluded. “He never suffered any kind of racism and humiliation like that boy over there,” The witcheress pointed down to Eragon. “There was, at no point in his denial, any kind of gloating about how humans are inferior and cannot even keep their dragon partners alive. When presenting his loss, he received nothing but support from the members of the multicultural, socially and racially diverse council –”

“I get it!” The elf hissed.

“But then! Horror of horrors!” Ciri dramatically lifted her index finger in the air. “He dares rebel! And for no reason whatsoever he takes undeserved revenge on the elven people, pushing them back to the forest, establishing a kingdom of humans in which he bizarrely enough strives to keep the elves who never did him and humanity nothing but good far, far away –”

“This isn’t fair!”

“Fuck no, it isn’t fair!” The witcheress growled. “It’s perfectly fine that you strip that kid of his family, his house and his neat little farm, perfectly fair that you string him and use him, perfectly just that you make him fight and kill for you! I should just look at that –” She gestured down with an open palm. “That kind of humiliation to him and to my people, that kind of shameless abuse, I should look at that and think it’s fine?!”

“The king is responsible for the loss of his family!”

Ciri pushed her index finger hard on the elf’s shoulder. “You killed his family on the moment you and your guerrilla stole the most valuable of the king’s treasures!”

Arya snarled, slapping the witcheress’ hand away. “That king killed my father!”

The blonde slammed both her palms hard on the railing. “Thank you! Finally! Petty fucking revenge, there you have it, was that so hard?!”

“What are you even trying to prove?!” the elf snarled, losing her cool and pushing the human back hard with her hands.

Ciri stumbled but did not lose her balance, burning fury shining through her emerald eyes.

“That you should woman the fuck up and live with what you are doing to that kid, to this country and to its people!” she pushed the other in retaliation. “That what was done to me wasn’t ‘reclaiming a lost lineage’, it was _rape_ , and that what you’re doing out there isn’t a crusade for justice, it is a political move, and it is _bloody fucking murder_!”

“You think I don’t know that?!” Arya shot back, her fists clenched. “You think I don’t feel the weight of every life taken –”

“Yeah, well, they’re still fucking dead. Now if you’ll excuse me,” Ciri interrupted, giving her back to the elf. “I’m going to introduce that asshole over there to my fist.”

 

* * *

 

“Change of plans, kid,” A voice that appeared as out of the blue as its owner called out from behind him. “Training time is over. Though I suppose you can stay and watch, if you want to.”

Eragon turned around to see the ashen-blonde he had met on the way to Ellesméra. The thought of her always gave him a sharp headache, as if something on his brain had been scrambled, and this time was no different. He touched his fingers to his temple, wincing.

Though she was often spotted around Arya, he hadn’t seen or heard much from neither of the women since his arrival, what with how busy he’d been with his training. Still, the way his body reacted to the part-elf was in perfect agreement with his impressions: she was trouble, and she was one big headache.

Tired and drained from his unfair training, he took a step back, deciding to let his instructor deal with that one. He reached out towards Saphira to tell her of the interesting turn of events.

 _“She has a certain gait to her”,_ he commented to his dragon partner as he watched the newcomer approach a clearly irritated Vanir. _“The way she moves, it’s rather arrogant.”_

 _“Like a cat,”_ Saphira shot back, and he got an accidental glimpse of the aerial maneuvering she was practicing with Glaedr.

“I would like to know the meaning of this,” His sparring partner demanded.

The woman didn’t answer. Instead, she drew her blade from the back in a bizarre movement that involved tapping the sheath up, theatrically spun it twice in the air and carved it in the ground. Then she carefully removed her leather gloves, hanging them on the sword’s pommel.

“The meaning of this is, why don’t you pick on someone your own size, huh?” She provoked, taking a couple steps forward. “It’s really easy to put down a sixteen year old kid. Why don’t you come over here and we have a real fight, woman to man? Use your blade, or don’t, I don’t care.”

Eragon grit his teeth, his cheeks flushed. He did not appreciate being treated as a child or having his skills diminished. He would have protested, but right then Vanir slid his blade back into is sheath and calmly removed his sword belt, which he hung on a nearby branch. She answered that with a grin.

“I didn’t like your attitude from the first day, Zireael.”

“You shouldn’t, I’ve been acting like a dick,” She confirmed. “I am naturally not an easy person and _everything_ about this Plane makes me irritated all the time. I think what I really need is –” She moved abruptly, quickly punching the air once, twice. “ – A way to burn all this pent up energy.”

Her feet left the ground, in short and energetic bounces. The blonde stretched her neck to the left, then to the right, causing her joints to pop. Then she took half a step forward, her right leg ahead of her left, right arm raised close to her face while the left rested close to her ribs. He frowned.

_That is a strange stance._

“Make no mistakes, this is bound to be a very technical fight,” a familiar voice called out from Eragon’s left.

He turned to see Arya approach and take a seat on a tree stump close by, looking tired and tense. He moved towards her and sat down on the ground to watch the brawl unfold.

Vanir smirked, arched his eyebrows, took a step back and changed his stance in return. He moved his fingers to form a claw, his left hand just above the knee, his right hand slightly extended and waving, teasing, in a hypnotizing movement. Arya touched her chin with her thumb and index finger and leaned forward in interest.

“Can Vanir actually fight hand-to-hand?” Eragon asked, then realized too late how petulant his question had been. “I mean –” he began, trying to make amends.

“Of course,” Arya interrupted, luckily disregarding his rudeness. “All elves undergo close combat training for at least a year. Vanir and I actually trained together. He’s good, both in swordplay and in – oh, there they go.”

 It was the blonde who struck first, in a series of movements so fast Eragon would have missed them, had Arya not pointed it out. Vanir deflected a sideway kick to the ribs by lifting his lower arm and pushing it off course, but Ciri was quick to retaliate. As soon as her right foot touched the ground, she bent her knee and took impulse, swinging her hips to the side, launching herself in the air in an impressive spinning kick. The elf answered in time, bending his body back just out of reach. The woman landed with a heavy _thud_ and resumed her previous stance, grinning. Vanir took a step back and locked eyes with her, still moving his upper hand in waves.

“Nice,” Arya mused, probably more to herself than to him.

He looked around. Elves had begun to gather and watch.

This time he took the initiative, hitting sideways with his clawed fingers only to meet air when the witcheress ducked. He didn’t stop however, chaining one blow after another in a stunning sequence, each of them being dutifully dodged by the woman.  Right in the end, while his upper guard was still open, she managed to land a quick jab in the face, just enough to make the elf flinch. She took advantage of the moment and swung her body, bringing her elbow towards his face, yet he recovered in time, and when his forearm defended the blow, his nails made a scratch on Ciri’s face.

The two backed up and caught their breaths. And then they lunged again.

Eragon watched the two carefully, learning what he could from the moves. He observed the woman the most because Vanir’s technique was far more fluid and elegant, but Ciri’s had an objectivity to it that made it seem more feasible. In his mind he mimicked it all: the way she covered her face with her arms before a kick, the way she ducked and lifted her elbow to catch the elf’s clawed slashes, the way she blocked his kicks by stepping back and catching the blow with her knee.

“What an art,” Arya commented at some point. “A formidable adversary even when she’s not bending the laws of magic, I should have known.”

“She’s holding up really fine against Vanir,” Eragon agreed.

“No, Vanir is holding up really fine against _her_ ,” she corrected. “Take pride in your instructor, Eragon, for he is a really good one.”

They were interrupted by the loud sound of impact, catching a glimpse of Vanir’s elbow connecting with the blonde’s face. She spat out a mouthful of blood and answered with a fierce combo of attacks, a sequence of fast punches and kicks that ended with her giving a hard knee to his ribs.

The sweat was running down their necks in rivulets, and yet they fought. Ciri ducked to avoid Vanir’s quick left-handed chop, but instead of getting back up, she dropped lower, hands touching the ground, gaining momentum for a spinning sweep kick that took the elf’s feet right off the ground. He fell on his back, hard, but instead of pursuing, Ciri took a step back, bent over, rested her palms on her knees and panted. Then she burst out laughing.

“Good game, good game,” She cheered before straightening up and offering her hand to the elf. Even the ugly, recently acquired purple bruise on her jaw did not taint her radiance. “Let’s call it a draw, and finish it another day, but with swords?”

The elf stood up, his black hair plastered with sweat against his forehead. For a tense moment, he left the woman hanging, and Eragon had half a mind they’d resume their fight right then. Instead, Vanir grabbed her hand in a firm grip and shook it.

“That’s…good technique. I can recognize it when I see it. It would be interesting to face you with a blade.”

She bowed her head, then stared off to the distance. “Likewise. Now if you’ll excuse me, master elf, I have certain…matters to attend to.”

And then, in a flash of blue, she was gone.

 

* * *

  

“…I just wanted to say, I’m sorry.”

Arya stared at the sheepish looking blonde, then sat up and rubbed her eyes, irritated. She sat up and muttered a quick spell to illuminate the room, then covered her eyes to shield them from the abrupt brightness.

“Do you have any idea of what time it is?” she complained.

_Of course she does._

“It’s only four past midnight,” Ciri retorted. “How old are you, twelve?”

“I rise with the sun,” Arya snapped.  “What do you want, Zireael?”

“That you not call me that, for starters,” the witcheress replied, carelessly plopping down on the elf’s mattress.

It was the final straw. Her patience finally ran out and she blew up.

“Menoa fucking damn it, Cirilla, what the fuck do you want?!” she snarled, getting up from her bed.

The woman tilted her head innocently. “…I brought you chocolates.”

_Don’t strangle her. Do not strangle –_

“I’m going to fucking strangle you!!”  She sat back down on the bedside, took a deep breath, and ran her palms over her face. “You come into my life, kidnap me, take me across time, spit on my beliefs, disrespect my people –”

“Mmmh. Chocolate?”  The blonde offered, extending her a bar of something edible.

“Get out. Now. Get out of here!!”

She grabbed a nearby something and threw on the woman’s direction. Predictably, the other evaded the attack, then lifted her open palms in a gesture of peace.

“Hey, I just came over to apologize –”

She grabbed the next heaviest object she found laying around.

“Apology _not_ accepted! Get the hell out!”

She tensed up, took aim and threw, but her projectile met only the empty space the witcheress had been.

  

* * *

 

 

Admittedly, she did pass the night terrified she’d wake up in one of the king’s cells – or worse, find out in the morning that the Apocalypse had started. So when the sun came out as bright and shiny as usual, she did not even try to hide her relief. Of course, that didn’t last long, because she found the blonde in her bedroom, _again_ , when she went back after lunch.

 For a moment, she was torn between yelling for help and charging in violently, but something else entirely caught her eyes. She’d learned to expect nonsense and eccentricities from the foreigner, and a lot of times, Arya simply didn’t know what the other was talking about at all. Every now and then, though, her curiosity got the best of her and she felt urged to make questions.

“…what are you wearing?”

The woman took off the bizarre hat and shook her long mane of hair free, then shrugged.

“Tee shirt,” She said, pointing to the top piece. “Jeans,” she gestured towards the blue pants.  “Sneakers,” she lifted both her feet up, showing off the strange shoes. “And a New Era Yankees cap,” she finished, putting the hat back on top of her head. “What, you didn’t think I’d be waiting for your highness all day, did you? I was skating.”

“But you don’t have to wait,” She pointed out. “You can just… turn up on a point in time in which I’m here.”

The witcheress frowned and stared at her in silence for a long three seconds. “…yes, I could… but I did not, because… I can spend that time in another universe… skating.”

“You can spend all your time in another universe, doing what you want,” Arya incited. “I’m not sure why you insistently come here at all.”

“Don’t you? We’re not so different, you and I.”

The elf sighed and sat down, straddling her work chair. “I’m guessing you’re just lonely. I suppose… I know the feeling of being alone in a land not my own. You do have a home world though, so I’m not sure why you don’t just settle.”

“Why didn’t you?” Ciri provoked. “You could have stayed put, but you signed up for the most dangerous job available instead.”

She gave the question some thought. “I think this forest is just a tad too small for me. I always feel very out of place here. It was fine when I… when I had my friends with me. Wherever we went always felt like home. But now they’re gone, I... I feel rather lost. Getting from the Varden to here in the company of a dwarf, a human and a dragon was…rough. But when we finally arrived and I was next to my kin, it didn’t feel much better. Now I’m just restless again.”

“Now just apply it to a transdimentional scale and bam! You got me all figured out.” She reached for something inside one of her pockets. “Chocolate?”

She pulled a big breath of air and let it out very slowly, then snatched the bar from the witcheress’ hands.

“You sure do sigh a lot when I’m around,” Ciri commented. “Could it be sighs of desire?”

Arya rolled her eyes. Her fingers moved deftly, and she tore the wrapping from the sweet, taking a moment to admire the strange texture of the material. “They’re sighs of aggravation. You’re incredibly frustrating to be around.”

“Yet you do tolerate me.”

“Because!” Arya grumbled between mouthfuls of chocolate. “It’s not like I have a choice? You just keep showing up.”

The blonde tilted her cap so that the brim was facing back, then leaned forwards and locked eyes with her, a sly smile touching her lips.

_She got rid of the bruises._

“So you don’t like me, not even a little?”

“Mmmh.” She swallowed the last bite. “You’re okay. You exasperate me a lot, and you can be downright spiteful and inconvenient, but you’re also spontaneous and I find that’s severely missing among my social circles. You do make me tense, though. You’re too fickle.”

That brought a glint to those emerald eyes. “Make you tense, huh. Good. That’s good.”

She _winked_.

Arya reeled back, her cheeks inexplicably flushing. She pointed an accusing finger at the blonde. “This…this!! This, I can’t understand. Why do you do it?”

Ciri arched her eyebrows. “…really? _Really?_ Of all the intricately complex pieces of my character, this is the one you can’t figure out? Seriously?” She stood up.

“Yes? You’re making me tense, right there.”

“Good!” The human grinned. “Good. You know, it’s both sad and a bit adorable that I have to spell this out for you. You’re a smart woman. Come on, make an effort. What could it possibly mean?”

She took off the cap again, this time putting it down on the desk, letting loose the long strands of ashen hair. The locks fell against her cheeks, framing her face, the nearly-white strings contrasting sharply with the vivid emerald eyes. Arya uncomfortably fiddled with the collar of her shirt.

“Um…” she paused.

_It doesn’t make any sense. You’re misinterpreting this._

Ciri bent down and rested her crossed arms on top of the chair’s back, her chin over her wrists, head tilted slightly.

_Too close._

“Well?” She spoke in an unusually soft tone.  Arya jumped to her feet and took a step back.

“Well, if you were a man, I’d see it as… very bold advances. Flirting. Courtship.”

_That’s pretentious and ridiculous. She’s going to laugh at you._

“Oh, if I were a man!” The witcheress rolled her eyes, definite annoyance in her tone. She took a step in her direction. Arya retreated instinctively.

“Yes, but you are not,” she stated the obvious, feeling dimwitted. “And if you’re not a man, then…”

“Then what?”

Another step forward. Another step back. The elf’s back hit the wall.

“I can’t think with you cornering me!” She protested.

Ciri stopped on her tracks, a look of playful condescendence in her face, arms crossed beneath her back. Arya took a deep breath and resumed rationalizing.

“If you were a man, then I’d think you were courting me, but that cannot be, because women don’t court women. Women don’t look at women…like that.”

The blonde rolled her eyes again, so hard Arya could have sworn she saw the insides of her skull.

“Why not?”

_Well, because!_

“Because…because…” she gestured exasperatedly, as if it were something beyond obvious. “It’s just never been done?”

_That is the worst argument to ever come out of your mouth. How can you call yourself a skeptic and an innovator and use this kind of –_

“You do realize your argument is ridiculous.” Ciri stated, looking bored out of her mind. “Not only because it’s dumb, but because it’s also untrue. It has been done. I assure you.”

“Well…”

“You know what has been done? This. All this.” She gestured vaguely. “Farm boy finds out magical destiny. Joins a group of terrorists – oh, I’m sorry,” She made air quotes, “A group of ‘rebels’. Meets his first mentor, who dies. Fights to overthrow the evil empire. Falls in love with the princess. Meets another mentor. He’s going to die and so is your mom; by this time next year you’ll be queen. Also, the broody kid who helped him rescue you and got lost in the big battle is alive, has a dragon, and is Eragon’s brother. I’m your father, I’m your brother, same shit.”

“What?! How do you –”

She pointed to herself with her thumbs. “Fucking time traveler!” She took a step forward. “I’ve seen it done a thousand times. Boring! Boring, boring, boring! No one ever realizes they’re the goddamn terrorists messing up the world. No one ever has a change of character.  No one ever considers treating the obvious case of depression and PTSD of the king. No one is ever gay! The hero eventually gets the princess. Well, admittedly, there was that one time the princess turned out to be the boy’s sister – whatever. ”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about, can we please go back to how people die and there’s another dragon –”

“No!!” Ciri all but yelled. “Let’s shake things up for a bit! You know, you were in my gaydar from the very first day. You looked at least bisexual, but so damn clueless.”

“I what – in your what – I don’t know what that’s supposed to mean?”

“My point exactly!” She closed the distance between the two, until they were separated by little less than a step. “I might be wrong – I’m usually not, but I might be. It’s easy to find out. You don’t have to like it, and if you don’t, you can just stop me. Push me off or something.”

_What?_

“What – !”

She wasn’t expecting Ciri’s next move, though whenever she thought back to that moment, she realized how obvious it was. Their lips met in a single smooth movement, making all the air escape her lungs more efficiently than any spell could have been. She felt the blood flow to her face, her cheeks burning, making her acutely aware of the blonde’s touch.

And touch she did, gently yet expertly, her fingers lightly brushing the elf’s scalp, cheeks, neckline, electricity lingering with every contact. Arya felt a tongue part her lips open and push itself in, intrusive and bold. Then the lightly damp lips moved around, to her jaw and cheeks and the base of her neck, soft fingers digging in her nape. Warm breath on her skin, a nibble at the sharp tip of her ear. Her body trembled.

Her mind went blank. Zero. Zilch. Nada.

“I _knew_ it!” Ciri pulled back suddenly, grinning, triumphant. “Hah. Hah! I knew it.”

And then, without any kind of warning, the witcheress winked and blinked out of existence. Arya stood still, wide eyed, for almost five minutes, letting the gears of her brain whirr back into work. She plopped down on her chair and caught her breath as her mind reassumed the skill of making coherent thoughts.

_WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK?_

_She’s actually a pretty great kisser –_

Arya picked the cap the blonde had forgotten on her desk and glared at it, as if it could give any answers.

_What the fuck, what the fuck, oh what the fuck even –_

_…did I…did I kiss back?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm actually kind of new to writing romance scenes in general, gay ones in particular, so I'd love to hear opinions from you guys about how I'm doing here! Good, bad, too fake, too sugary?


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